Wednesday, December 26, 2007

We went to see BALLS OF FURY on the grounds that in our fragile state (the variety of the wine) we couldn't handle anything too cerebral. On the other hand, as we were soon to discover, there's a level of brainlessness that can exert its own special kind of pain on the poor hapless cinema-goer.

BALLS OF FURY is brought to you by the cinematic gurus (sarcasm) behind the altogether dismal RENO 9-11: MIAMI. This time, writer-director Ben Garant and writer-actor Thomas Lennon try to spoof martial arts and under-dog sports movies. Trouble is, this is territory that has been mined with greater success by recent classics such as DODGEBALL or even BLADES OF GLORY. Dan Fogler plays a washed up ping-pong player called Randy Daytona. Daytona is recruited by the FBI to bring down a sinister triad and ping-pong fanatic (Christopher Walken).

The jokes are weak - alternately sexist or racist. The plot is entirely predictable. And I spent most of the movie feeling embarassed for the actors - especially Walken. And as for Aisha Tyler, she loses all credibility as a guest reviewer on Siskel and Ebert given her choice of script.

BALLS OF FURY was released in the US, Singapore, Russia, the Philippines, Ukraine, Iceland, Slovenia, Australia, Kuwait, Greece, Spain earlier this year and is currently playing in the UK. It opens in Argentina on January 17th 2008.